Today I am having a very delicious Bengali sweet recipe, which is loved by almost every sweet tooth. My son is a fussy eater yet he always love to relish on these yummy sweets. He always want to have it. So thought why not to give it a try at home also to satisfy him to core. Though the chhena ( cheese) made from carton milk is not as easy to roll into a nice dough but I managed to prepare these. That's why shapes are not as smooth as we get in market but taste wise, full marks given by my lil one. Today I am not having step wise pics as it was not pre planned and also was not sure for the awesome outcome , so didn't click pics. But will try to explain at my best and will add pics too , when prepare it again. Hope you all will love to try this delicious treat and come up with your feedback.
** Updating stepwise pics too as per my promise☺️☺️
EGGLESS RAS MALAI
Serves: 6-7 ( will make 15-16 regular size dumplings)
Time : 1 hr
Ingredients
For chhena:
1 1/4 lt full cream milk ( cow's fresh milk is best)
2 tsp white vinegar/ lemon juice( as per need)
For syrup:
1 lt water
1 cup sugar
For base milk:
3/4 lt milk
3-4 tbsp sugar ( as per taste)
8-10 strands saffron ( kesar) , soaked in 1 tbsp warm milk
1 tbsp pistachio, finely sliced
1 tbsp rose water ( optional)
Method:
For chhena:
Boil milk and switch off the flame. Add vinegar , 1 tsp at a time and mix well. Let it sit for some time and check whether it is cuddled or not. If needed add more vinegar and check.
When all the milk is cuddled and whey is separated , strain it in a muslin cloth. Now wash it under tap water thoroughly to get rid of any vinegar in chhena.
Now tie a knot on muslin cloth and hang it for 3-4 hrs or till all the extra water drips from it and it remain only moist not water laden.
* don't cook milk after adding vinegar/ lemon juice, it hardens the chhena.
* But don't over do hanging your cheese as if the chhena become dry you can't make proper dough with it.
* don't add too much vinegar or lemon juice at a time, it will make your chhena hard. Add little at a time and give some time to curdle and then use next batch.
* Always use only required amount of vinegar/ lemon juice. Vinegar gives much better result , so if possible go for vinegar instead of lemon juice.
Now your chenna is ready to be kneaded as dough. Knead this for 5-6 mins using your Palm to a smooth greasy non sticky dough ( it will release ghee when kneaded well).
* I used carton milk so my dough was not as much greasy and was sticky too. If you are using carton milk then don't expect a clean dough and knead for at least 8-10 mins.
** While making it again this time , I used fresh cows milk available here in plastic gallon and is pretty better than carton milk to make chhena.
To get best chhena and ras malai like store ones , I will advice to use cow's milk.
** Here only packaged milk is available, so I used that. It's little tricky to use packaged milk for making chhena dough but not impossible. Just have some patience 😊, as I did 😜.
For cooking chhena dumplings in sugar syrup:
Boil water and sugar in a wide deep pan ( as chenna expands to double on cooking) till rolling hot. Now make small flat discs of chhena dough little bigger than a coin and put in rolling hot sugar syrup .
Let it cook for a while to check it is not breaking during cooking. If it is breaking then knead your dough for more 2-3 mins and then make discs.
If it's not breaking while cooking then add all the prepared discs one by one carefully in boiling suger syrup.
Cover with lid and Let it cook on high flame for 10 - 15 mins then lower the flame and let it cook for another 10 mins. Switch off the flame and let it cool down completely before dipping in prepared milk .
** If you feel your sugar syrup is getting much thicker while boiling then add some water.
* always add chenna discs in rolling hot sugar syrup. If it's not boiling then discs may scatter in syrup.
* To check whether your chhena discs are cooked well, dip one cooked disc in normal water in a bowl. If the cooked chhena settles down then it is completely cooked otherwise cook for more minutes and check again for doneness.
* let the chhena cool completely in sugar syrup before removing it from pan to avoid breaking your chhena dumplings as they are too delicate to handle while hot.
For milk condensing:
Meanwhile your chhena dumplings were preparing, boil 3/4 lt of milk till it remain 1/2 lt. Add sugar and
Saffron to it and simmer for 4-5 minutes.
Switch off the flame and let it cool completely. Add rose water and pistachio.
Now add prepared chhena dumplings one by one to it by squeezing a little, don't press too hard otherwise dumplings will break.
Let it chill in refrigerator before serving.
Your super delicious ras malai is ready to please your guests and loving ones.
Prepare these easy and tempting sweet dish and earn lots and lots of praise .
I tried to short out all the do's and don't in my post but even if there is any thing left then please let me know in the comments box below so that I can clarify at my best.
Hope you will love to try this super delicious sweet treat and don't forget to share your experience with me here, they meant a lot.
Happy cooking....
